by Delta James
She leaned back into his strong frame and felt the hand that had been clasped around her waist reach up to cup her breast, his thumb briefly swiping her engorged nipple. His other hand that had been over her mouth slipped down to span the column of her neck in a gesture that was caressing as opposed to threatening. Her arousal spiked and she found she wanted nothing more than to be enveloped in his embrace and to be exploring his mouth and body with her own.
The sound of others approaching caused him to spin her into a small crevice within the wall and press her against it. She listened intently and felt his body gather itself as the other men walked by. When the others had passed and she and the shifter remained undiscovered she felt the tension leave his body.
“Stay,” he said and moved away from her.
She made to follow him but was swiftly put back against the wall. His hand came up to cover her mouth as the other one connected sharply with her bottom. She yelped but the sound was muffled by his hand.
“I said stay,” he growled.
Again, she felt the sound reverberate in her body. It rattled her bones and the rising heat in her blood spread like wildfire throughout.
This time when he released her she stayed… but only for a moment. Maddie quietly followed him and came up to stand beside him. He blocked her from moving past him with an outstretched arm. He turned toward her briefly and scowled. She could only barely see what appeared to be three men heading down toward the river where they took a beached inflatable boat and slipped into the Mississippi.
Once the men in the boat had put considerable distance between themselves and her hiding place with the shifter, he turned on her, taking her by the shoulders. He had a handsome face in a dark and brooding way. Tall, at 6′4″, with powerful shoulders and what she could feel were sculpted abs leading to a narrow waist and well-muscled extremities. He had dark, soulful brown eyes and black curly hair worn longer than most. There was a natural stubble she guessed that was close to permanent. Those dark eyes now blazed with anger, and she could feel the emotion rolling off of him. He took her by the hand and drew her back to a small gazebo. Sitting down on one of the built-in benches, he pulled her across his lap.
“What the hell?” Maddie started.
The shifter’s hand came crashing down on her upturned bottom.
Maddie yelped.
“When-You-Are-Told-To-Stay-You-Stay.” Each word was punctuated with a hard swat to her backside. “You-Will-Behave.”
Maddie could not believe that this man to whom she had been so wildly attracted moments before was spanking her. Each swat imparted a burning and lasting sting. The sting seemed to spread exponentially across the width of her ass and compounded upon itself. She’d never been spanked in her life. She was quite certain that she could have lived the rest of her life without ever having experienced it. But worse than the humiliation and discomfort from the spanking itself was the realization that her attraction to her would-be protector had increased dramatically.
The part of her brain that was still functioning rationally hoped that he couldn’t tell how aroused she was and that proof of that arousal had begun to pool in her nether region. Emotionally she hoped that not only would he notice, but that he would do something to alleviate her growing arousal.
The shifter stood up, ensuring that she didn’t fall from his hard thighs but instead was stood upright. Before she could think to draw back her hand to crack him across his face, he brought her hard against his body and his mouth descended on hers. The kiss was not a normal first kiss that was exploring or tentative in any way. This was a kiss of passion and possession. A declaration of things to come.
Her reverie and the dream itself were broken when she heard the third step from the bottom of the staircase creak. She knew it took more than one hundred pounds of pressure to cause the stair to make that noise. Maddie sat upright in bed, reaching for the paisley and lace robe she kept on the footboard of her antique iron bed.
Maddie always slept with her door closed. Quietly she crept from the end of her bed to the doorway into the hall and turned the lock. She backed away and leaned down to grab the baseball bat she kept under her bed. She strained to hear when whoever it was reached the landing outside her bedroom.
She thought about hiding in the closet, but then decided the bathroom was better as it had a window to the back roof. If push came to shove, she might have to go out the window and down the trellis to her backyard and then escape out onto the well-lit street. She backed toward the bathroom. Her breath caught in her throat when she saw and heard the intruders try the doorknob.
They were very quiet until they realized the door was locked. They rattled the door with increased anger and then put their shoulder or shoulders into the door trying to force it open. She wished at that point that she hadn’t left her cell phone downstairs in the charger.
Maddie called out, “You need to leave; I’m calling 9-1-1.”
Her bluff was greeted by sinister laughter as the door gave way and three men entered her room.
Maddie brought the bat up into a defensive posture. They might be able to take her down, but she’d do considerable damage before they did.
“Well, well, well,” said the tallest and roughest-looking of the bunch in a thick Eastern European accent, “what a tasty treat. Perhaps we’d be better off to turn her and send her home than just dispose of her.”
The one next to him grabbed his crotch and squeezed it. “If nothing else, have a little fun…”
Maddie knew she couldn’t afford to panic. The phrase ‘turn her’ let her know she was dealing with shifters. She kept a wary eye on them.
“Oliver Halsey of the Hamptons pack is a friend of mine. If I go missing, he’ll know. Some of your kind tried to turn me without my consent last year. Things didn’t go too well for them. And Jean-Michel Gautier is aware of your presence in his city…” She hoped desperately they weren’t working for Gautier. “I understand when crossed, he can be deadly.”
The name Halsey had stopped their advance. The use of Gautier’s name seemed to give them cause for concern.
From behind them, she heard a new voice, “I’d listen to her, boys, she is quite correct. Jean-Michel knows you’re in New Orleans. He sent us to watch over the lady and to bring her home if we thought it best. We also had instructions to bring at least one of you back for questioning. Nice of you to be here; you’ll save us having to make an extra stop.”
The man speaking now came into clearer view. He was tall and muscular with shaggy blond hair and light eyes that seemed to have taken on the same feral gleam she had seen in Oliver Halsey’s the previous year in London before she saw him shift for the first time.
The shaggy-haired man continued, “Do you want to come quietly or should we take down two of you? Jean-Michel said we only needed one.”
The original intruders shifted. As terrified as she was, Maddie was still fascinated with the speed and transformation from man to wolf that presented itself. All three of the bad guys, as she had begun to think of them, shifted and leapt toward the men she assumed were part of Gautier’s pack. Gautier’s men shifted as well and met the bad guys in midair.
Later, Maddie would wonder why she hadn’t taken the opportunity when the men were more involved with each other than her to make her escape. She watched and listened as the five wolves fought. First it was growls all around, but it became apparent early on that Gautier’s men would be the victors. She watched in a kind of mesmerized horror as one of the intruding wolves went down permanently with his throat ripped out. The other two quickly shifted back to their human forms and knelt in supplication to Gautier’s men.
The shaggy-haired man and his pack mate shifted back as well. He walked toward Maddie carefully, wiping the blood from his mouth. He reached up and took the bat from her. “You’re safe, Ms. Stone. We’ll make sure these mutts won’t be a problem.” He turned to the man with him. “Peter, get on the phone and let them know back home we need a clean-up cre
w.”
The man headed out onto the landing and removed his cell phone from his pocket. Maddie could not overhear his conversation.
“Don’t we have to call the cops?” asked Maddie quietly.
“We try to keep this kind of thing contained within the shifter society. We’ll make sure your home is restored. You won’t find a trace of what went down here when you return.”
“I’m not going anywhere.”
The shaggy-haired man shook his head and smiled kindly. “I’m afraid you don’t have a choice. Trust me, these mutts didn’t come here without someone sending them, which means someone knows you know about us and considers you a threat. I’ve got orders to get you to safety. Right now, that means the plantation. You wouldn’t have any zip ties in the house, would you?”
“Uhm, yes. In the kitchen, Bottom drawer on the left-hand side. What do you want with zip ties?”
“We’ll bind these boys up and put them in their SUV in the back where they can’t make trouble. Then we’ll head home.” Seeing the other man return, he said to him, “Jean-Michel have anything to add?”
“Not really. He said to secure them and get back to the plantation… with Ms. Stone in tow. He’ll have the place cleaned up. He said to reassure Ms. Stone that we mean her no harm and that we knew about her from Oliver Halsey.” He turned to Maddie. “Oliver briefed Jean-Michel on who you were and what happened in London.” The man walked forward. “I’m Peter, by the way; he’s Geoff.”
Maddie’s gracious manners carried her through the awkward introductions.
“Nice to meet you. Well, not the circumstances, but still I’m awfully glad you were here. If it’s all the same to you, I’ll just wait here until your crew gets through and get back to my writing.”
“I’m afraid that won’t be possible,” said Geoff. “Jean-Michel wants you safe and that means at home. Would you like to pack a few things? Peter, let’s get these mutts downstairs and ready to travel. We’ll give you a little bit of privacy to get dressed and get your things together. Please don’t take too long, I want us out of here as soon as possible.”
The two remaining intruders got to their feet. It was funny, Maddie thought, that she didn’t think of Geoff or Peter as intruders. She had to admit to herself as they took the intruders downstairs that they had saved her from whatever fate the intruders had planned. However, if they thought she was just going to go blithely along with whatever Jean-Michel Gautier had in store for her, they were sadly mistaken.
She followed them to the landing and quietly closed the doors. Stepping over the dead man’s body, she quickly threw some things together and put them in her carpetbag and got dressed. Instead of heading downstairs to leave with Peter and Geoff, Maddie went into her bathroom, closed and locked the door, and headed out the window. She was negotiating the trellis fairly well even with the heavy bag. She was almost at the bottom when she felt herself losing her grip.
Maddie knew hitting the ground was going to be painful and so willed herself not to make a sound as she did so. Instead of the jarring impact with the ground she expected, she found herself caught by a strong pair of arms.
“The stairs would have been easier and safer. Now you’ve gone and cost me twenty bucks. Peter said he thought you’d make a break for it. I told him you weren’t that foolish. I guess I don’t know human females as well as I like to think.”
Geoff escorted her to the SUV that had been backed into the drive and the two intruders put into the back.
“According to your mate, you know little to nothing about most females…” teased Peter, which only elicited a low growl from Geoff. “Except, of course, how to make her happy.”
“Better,” admonished Geoff with a chuckle. “And I am an expert at making her happy.”
Peter opened the door for Maddie and helped her into the passenger side front seat, taking her bag from her.
“He really is an expert with Summer, which is astonishing considering how difficult she was when she first joined us.”
“Not difficult,” said Geoff, “just spirited.”
The SUV doors closed and locked automatically as Geoff put the vehicle in drive.
“Did you move our car out of that little hidey hole?” He looked in the rearview mirror and saw Peter nod. “Good.”
“Don’t let him kid you, Ms. Stone. His Summer is spirited now; back then she was a very naughty mate and spent more than her fair share of time face down over Geoff’s knee.”
Geoff chuckled and his face softened as he thought of his mate. “She just needed a bit more persuading than some. As I recall, your Lily ran away before returning to the pack and succumbing to your charms.” He turned toward Maddie. “Lovely girl, our Lily. What she sees in the techno-nerd back there I’ll never understand.”
Both men laughed. Maddie recognized they were trying to put her at ease. They were failing.
“You do know this is kidnapping, right?” she asked.
“I suppose technically. We’d prefer to think of it as an extended rescue,” said Geoff pleasantly.
“He’d really love it if you’d think of it that way. If not, both Summer and Darby—that’s Jean-Michel’s mate—will make his and Jean-Michel’s life hell. Summer being pissed and incensed is one thing. Darby will take it to a whole other level.” Both men laughed again. “Think she’ll throw knives at him again?”
Geoff laughed. “I doubt it. She got herself in deep trouble with him for that. As I recall she couldn’t sit down comfortably for almost a week. And I think he made her write ‘I will not throw knives at my beloved mate’ over a thousand times.”
As they were now on the highway, Maddie recognized she had little hope of escaping her two would-be protectors. With that option no longer available, she decided to indulge her curiosity.
“And you find that behavior an acceptable way to treat a woman? To beat her and then make her write something repeatedly?”
“Not beat,” said Geoff. Looking at Peter in the rearview mirror again, he said, “Why is it when they or their friends have been naughty and get called on it that we’re accused of beating them? No man in Jean-Michel’s pack has ever beat or abused a woman in any way. Jean-Michel wouldn’t have it. The man would have ended up dealing with Jean-Michel… not something one wants to do when you’ve pissed him off.”
“Unless you’re Darby,” said Peter, laughing. “If Summer was difficult when she first arrived, Darby was hell on wheels.”
“But she does respect him and most of the time her attitude reflects it. She loves him deeply. They’re actually well matched.”
“And you think he loves her?” questioned Maddie.
Both men nodded.
Peter said, “Trust me, five minutes around the two of them, even if they’re quarreling and you’ll be able to feel it. She completes him in ways none of us even knew he needed. Don’t get me wrong, Jean-Michel has always been the best alpha anyone could ask for. He’s strong, tough, and takes care of those he loves and calls family and pack. He’s always been quick to laugh and enjoy life. But Darby brought him a serenity, joy, and I don’t know what to call it… but he’s just better. That’s the thing about fated mates, we bring out the best in each other. Don’t you think, Geoff? I know I’m a much better man because of Lily and now, Michaela—my daughter.”
“I agree. I think I was always a good omega for the pack…”
“The best,” interrupted Peter, “and our JD is second to none as a beta.”
Geoff smiled. “But I’m better than I was. I have another opinion on matters that require my attention… a decidedly feminine point of view and often consider things I didn’t before.”
“Do women have any voice at all in your society?” asked Maddie.
“Of course they do. They aren’t the ultimate decision maker, but only a fool makes decisions in a vacuum. Our society has existed as long as yours and dissolution of a union is rare. While with humans it seems to get higher and higher with each successive generati
on.”
Maddie decided to switch her line of questioning. “So, who are those guys in the back? Why were they after me? And what’s going on in your society in New Orleans?”
Nothing but silence met her question. The two men looked at each other.
“Clearly Jean-Michel was right that you’ve been poking your nose where you shouldn’t be. That’s not a good idea when you don’t have the teeth to back it up,” said Geoff.
Maddie thought it was interesting that he didn’t sound angry or upset with her, but more scolding. She felt as though she were being reprimanded for doing something she shouldn’t. There was something about the way he did it that made her feel as though she should apologize and promise to behave in the future.
She shook her head to try to shake that feeling off.
“But I’m right, aren’t I?” she asked. “There is something going on. Am I such a threat that those guys wanted to hurt me?”
“Your poking around is more of a nuisance than anything. Those mutts are here we think as part of an advance team for several reasons, one of which is to find human females they can turn and make into breeders. Isn’t that how you met Oliver Halsey?”
“Yes, in London,” she said. “Some guys snatched me and wanted to turn me. Oliver stopped them. But why are they turning humans? Have your females revolted against your somewhat draconian hierarchy?”
“Draconian? That’s a bit judgmental,” said Geoff. “Have you ever seen how a pack works? Talk to the women involved? Or are you just talking about your schoolgirl notions of what the perfect society looks like.”
“Easy, Geoff,” said Peter.
Geoff shook his head. “Sorry. No, our women aren’t out to overthrow our society… at least not most of them. But the reason is that born female shifters are becoming more rare. In order for our species to survive, some look to humans. Every Ruling Council in the world has decreed that a human can only be turned with her full knowledge and informed consent. The problem is with declining numbers in born shifters, some packs are turning women without their consent. That’s what almost happened to you in London and what these mutts were planning. Thus the reason Jean-Michel wants you home where we can protect you.”
